Month: November 2022

I enjoy perusing the racks of promo cards in tourist areas. In Sisters, most of them were for things in and outside of Bend, but this brochure caught my eye.

To take part in Riddle Routes, you pay for the route. From there, you get a document that tells you where the starting point is and then a link to the game that you play on your smart phone. My document told me to go to the wrong starting point, but I texted and confirmed that I was in the incorrect location. This was great as it was 27 degrees and I didn’t want to wander around unnecessarily.

The game was quite fun. I enjoyed all aspects of it: scavenger hunts, riddles, trivia questions, turn by turn directions.

On the way, I walked by Paulina Springs Books. It was fun to see the bookstore that has been read aloud for many years as an NPR sponsor.

Here’s my self portrait in front of their very fun mural.

There was a tricky question I needed to research, so I took a break and had some hot chocolate and a delicious piece of focaccia at the Sisters Bakery. Then it was back on the route.

In the end, I flubbed two questions, which got me a Detective in Training badge. Not too bad given how very cold it was.

Riddle Routes was a great experience, and I will search out their other Oregon routes.

After I finished the route, I had covered the main drag of Sisters in multiple ways and knew exactly what stores I wanted to go back and visit.

I woke up to find that it was 25 degrees outside. I did not hurry out of my warm room. Instead, I lingered near the fire nursing my tea. But because I came to the town to explore it, I headed out. It was slick. Not really freezing rain-type ice, but just enough coating to make me step carefully. The only other people I saw walking where gingerly making their way from their cars to shop doors.

And that gray sky never got any lighter. And the temperature only increased by two degrees.

Here is the aforementioned path to town via the campground. You can see that it had snowed at some point, but not much was left.

And here are some turkeys taking advantage of the empty campground.

There was a pretty covered bridge over the creek.

And a nice entry to the creek that probably gets some good use on hot summer days.

I had some business at the post office, so I walked there. After mailing my package, I stopped to read the lineup of postmasters. It looks like the Smith family had a lock at the beginning. And I can’t tell if Yvonne is the current postmaster or if they have wandered away from this way of tracking. If so, Yvonne has been at it a very long time, especially compared to her peers.

FivePine has cabins and a lodge with rooms. I choose a lodge room and it was fan-tas-tic. It was bigger than my first studio apartment.

Just inside the door was this wet bar area with a microwave and a refrigerator. I especially appreciated the electric tea kettle and complementary tea.

There was a big comfy bed and two comfortable chairs by the fire. Outside, there was a little patio with chairs, that was very close to the pool. The pool is closed for the season, and it was a little too cold of patio sitting, but I bet it’s nice out there in other seasons.

There was also a desk area, should you want to do some work other than resting your bags.

The bathroom was about the size of the main area of my first studio apartment. There was a big shower, a toilet room, two sinks and a very large tub.

The room also came with a guest book and I read through it while drinking my complementary tea. A couple of people exclaimed in their entries “The water came from the ceiling!” I had no idea what they were talking about until I ran a bath.

Even being primed with news of water coming from the ceiling, I still shrieked with delight when the water came from the ceiling to fill up my bathtub.

I give FivePine five stars. Very fun experience. And there’s a complementary wine hour.

I wanted to get out of town and found that I could take the bus to Sisters via Shuttle Oregon. So I did. The bus trip was great. It was a half-size bus (I guess one would call it a shuttle bus?), and I had a reservation for two nights at FivePine Lodge, a hotel that just happens to be a stone’s throw away from the Sisters Movie House, a four-screen theater.

I was worried about my walk from the bus drop-off location to FivePine Lodge. It was a straight shot and about a mile away, but that straight shot was on a major highway that I guessed wasn’t going to be great for walking next to. So I carefully plotted out a walking route via Google Maps and took pictures of the route, just in case I didn’t have cell phone service.

I need not have worried. Just past where the Military Trucks place is flagged, was a pedestrian trail that took me through a campground next to a creek and popped me out right next to downtown. There was adequate signage so I easily found the trail. The trip was just getting started and it was already off to a good start.

I missed lunch and knew I would need to get food in my stomach before the complementary wine and beer offerings at FivePine, so I took myself over to Three Creeks Brewing and ate a sandwich and fries while reading by the fire.

After that, I enjoyed my wine and then watched The Banshees of Inisherin at the Sisters Movie House. The movie theater was great. The movie, I did not like.

Then it was back to my spacious room for a good night’s sleep.